


Having Fun Isn't Hard When You've Got a Library Card

by Elliefint



Category: The House in the Cerulean Sea - T. J. Klune
Genre: Arthur the Polyglot, Arts & Crafts, Autistic Linus Baker, Bellhops, Chauncey Helps, David Appears in Epilogue, David Likes Math, Found Family, Golden Oldies, Library, Linus's Childhood, Lucy Scares People, Lucy is six, M/M, Making Friends, Marsyas Community, Phee Has Questions, Phee's Trees, Post-Canon, Pre-Epilogue, Retrocomputing, Sal's Writing, Self-Indulgent Retrocomputing, Talia's Garden, Talia's Lifespan, Theodore's Communication, Theodore's Hoard, Trips to the Village, Zoe Has A Crush, Zoe and Phee
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-25
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:47:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27704369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elliefint/pseuds/Elliefint
Summary: On their first trip to the village after Linus gets back, it comes to light that none of the kids have library cards. They go fix this immediately.
Relationships: Linus Baker/Arthur Parnassus, Zoe Chapelwhite/Helen
Comments: 32
Kudos: 30





	1. Lucy

Lucy jumped down from his booster seat as he and his siblings piled out of the van in front of the stately, off-white building. Linus and Zoe hopped out with them before Arthur drove off to park the van—it had been decided that this was a safer option than trying to corral six enthusiastic children across a busy parking lot. And it was busy! The Marsyas Public Library seemed to be a well-loved part of the village, and Lucy couldn’t wait to get inside and see what was so great about it.

It had been Mr. Baker—no, Linus now, Lucy reminded himself gleefully—who had brought up the idea of going to the library. He was in the process of officially moving to Marsyas Island and was planning on taking the opportunity on this trip into town to complete a few errands such as updating the address on his ID. “And, of course,” he had said, “I’ll need to get myself a local library card. I’ve always considered that one of the most important steps in moving to a new place.” A thought had seemed to strike him at that point, and he had turned to Arthur. “Say, do the children have library cards here? It’s only recently that they’ve started going into town—have they gotten the chance to sign up for them yet?” This was their third outing in total, and their first since Linus’s return.

“They don’t have their own cards, no, but Zoe and I regularly check things out for them on ours. Books they’ve asked about or that we think they might like, and of course the ones they need for their studies. And they have our personal library at home, too, of course.”

Linus didn’t seem quite satisfied with this arrangement. “It’s just that part of the joy in going to the library is exploring a whole building full of every kind of book you can imagine, picking out anything you want, anything that strikes your interest in the moment, anything you see and realize you want to know more about.” He sounded kind of reverent. Apparently, Linus was a fan of libraries.

The kids liked the sound of that. “Whatever we want in the whole library?” Chauncey asked with stars in his eyes at the idea.

Phee grinned. “Absolutely anything we want to know?”

Theodore chirped excitedly.

Lucy bounced in his seat. “I want to get a book about poisonous snakes!” he announced. “Or about those guys that got lost in the mountains and ate each other!”

“The Donner Party?” Talia supplied.

“Yeah, them! Or… or the great plague!” His mind danced with the possibilities.

“I bet they have books about all kinds of hotels!” Chauncey said.

Even Sal spoke up. “I’m sure there will be so many amazing things to read.”

In retrospect, Lucy couldn’t recall anyone ever confirming that they were going to the library before all of those hopes and plans were voiced, but after all of that, how could they do anything else? So, their first stop in town was here, and now Arthur was on his way back from parking the car, so it was finally time to go inside.

The whole group filed in through the big double doors, as Zoe gave a reminder that this was a big building and she couldn’t detect them here like she could on the island, so they should make sure to stay reasonably close to an adult. She made an exception for Sal, which Lucy didn’t think was very fair. Being the youngest was hard.

There was a lot to take in when they got inside. The entryway opened up to a spacious, well-lit lobby. Librarians at the desk worked on computers (computers!) with glowing orange screens. Talia spotted and pointed out a little area labeled “Seed Library” and resolved to go check it out later. Arrow signs pointed the way to countless sections: fiction, nonfiction, event rooms, and… “It’s over there!” Phee said. She had been the first to spot the stairwell on the other end of the room with the down-diagonal arrow pointing to “Children’s”.

They made their way over there as Lucy continued to look around the library lobby. There were displays set up with seasonally relevant books about fall in general and about Health Literacy Month, Earth Science Week, Merfolk Heritage Month, and of course, Halloween. The Halloween display was absolutely righteous, of course, but the book that really caught Lucy’s eye was actually displayed with the new releases. “Wait, hold on!” he said, rushing over to the shelf and standing on his tiptoes to grab the book in question. It was beautiful: there was a picture on the cover of a creature with no skin, just some kind of animal skull with horns, several bony arms, a ribcage with strange white fuzz on it, and two big wings with eyes. It was the best thing Lucy had ever seen, and he was already devising plans for the best opportunities to conjure that image. He couldn’t wait to start reading!

He opened up to the beginning and found a boring introduction, so he skipped to a random early page. He squinted at it, “Per… perhaps… necka…?” he began (out loud, because he was still new at silent reading and he couldn’t do it if he needed to sound out hard words). “Oh! Nece… necess… ne-cess-ar-y. Perhaps necessary to just-i-fy perk… perce…”

“Perceived,” Phee supplied from over his shoulder, “and then ‘successes,’ which has both C sounds.” Lucy scowled. He was working on it!

Arthur gently took the book from Lucy’s hands, which was probably a good call, as Lucy’s increasingly forceful and frustrated grip threatened to wrinkle the pages of the poor paperback. “Now, Lucy, what did we say about being gentle with the library books?” he reminded him.

Lucy knew Arthur was right about that, but he still crossed his arms and sulked. “We have to take care of the books because a lot of people share them and if we ruin them it’s not fair to the next person, and also we don’t want to have to pay for them out of our allowance.”

“Exactly!”

‘Perhaps necessary to justify perceived successes.’ Well, that was boring. It had nothing to do with the eye-winged demon on the cover. Still, the creature must have been in the book somewhere. He took the book back, careful to be gentle with it this time, and eyed it warily. “I’ll have to do better when I take this home to read it.”

“Are you sure you want to take that book?” Arthur asked. “It didn’t seem like you were enjoying it very much when you were reading it.”

“I know I would like it,” Lucy said. “It’s just that I guess I’m not smart enough to read it.”

Arthur knelt to Lucy’s eye level and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “It’s not a matter of being smart enough, my dear. You are very bright, but you just haven’t been reading for very long yet. Maybe this is a book you can come back to when you’ve had more practice.”

That made Lucy feel better, but he still eyed the book hesitantly.

“When we get downstairs,” Linus said, “I know that you’ll find countless books you’ll like. We can even ask the librarians to help us find something. In my experience, children’s librarians are very helpful and smart, and know practically everything there is to know about books for newer readers.”

Lucy thought about that. He guessed that would be okay. “I’ll bring this down there with me, so I can show them what I’m looking for. I’ll say, ‘a book just like this but with smaller words and sentences.’”

“Hmm, right, well, we can certainly try that,” Linus said.

As they regrouped to head downstairs, Linus noticed that some of the books on the new releases display had caught Arthur’s eye. “Do you want to look around up here and then meet us downstairs?” he said. “Zoe and I can take the children. It’s your outing too, after all.”

Arthur seemed surprised at the suggestion. “If you’re sure it’s alright.”

“Go ahead,” Zoe agreed.

So, Arthur stayed in the lobby, Sal hesitantly broke off from the group to look around on his own, which Lucy still didn’t think was fair, and the rest of them hurried downstairs to Children’s.

When they got downstairs, most of the kids split up to explore the room on their own, but Lucy took Linus’s hand and marched straight up to the desk. “Hi,” he said. “I’m here about books.”

The librarian grinned. “Well, you’re in the right place, my friend! We certainly have books.”

“I have specific requirements,” he went on. “You see, I found a book upstairs I wanted to read, but it was above my reading level. I need help finding something like it, but for beginners.” He placed the book in question on the counter.

The librarian eyed it with some uncertainty. “Scary stories, huh?”

“Stories that would scare _most_ people,” he clarified. “I won’t be scared at all. I’m not afraid of anything.” Well, except bugs, and being lost all alone, and bad dreams, and… well anyway, she didn’t need to know any of that. “I need stories I can relate to, as the spawn of the infernal. Demonic forces, death and destruction, that kind of thing.”

“I see,” she said. “Well, um, let’s take a look.” She typed something quick on her computer and then led them to a beginning readers’ shelf along a nearby wall. Lucy appreciated that unlike the one upstairs, this shelf didn’t go higher than he could comfortably reach. She selected a particular book and gave it to him. He admired the group of characters on the cover that included some see-through zombies, a skeleton dog or cat, and a ghostly pirate. “That’s a collection of ghost stories and poems. It’s a classic and a lot of fun, especially with Halloween coming up.”

She smiled at Linus. “Some of those are darker than others, but it’s not as scary as the author’s stuff for older kids, so it’s usually okay for kids this age if they know that horror’s what they’re looking for.”

‘Not as scary’ hurt. All he needed was words he could sound out. She wasn’t taking him seriously! “You don’t need to worry about what’s too scary for me,” he said. At this point the room began to darken and Lucy’s slowly deepening voice was augmented by a growing chorus of identical ones emanating from the walls themselves, “I am the darkness and the void. Through this vessel I was incarnated to sow death and destruction! The world shall tremble at—”

“Lucy, that’s enough!” Linus interrupted. “And we talked about using indoor voices at the library.”

“Sorry,” Lucy mumbled in just the one voice that came from his mouth.

“I’m not the only one you need to apologize to.”

He turned to the librarian, who had gone pale with wide eyes. “I’m sorry about that, miss. I hope you’ll forgive me enough to keep giving me books.”

The librarian took a moment to catch her breath and compose herself. “Right. Well. You’re looking for stories that are written at a beginner level, but are scary enough for someone older than that? Is that alright with your…” She gave Linus a questioning look. “Is this your dad?”

“Sure,” Lucy said, but Linus looked surprised. “Wait, is it not alright?”

“It’s alright, although we’ll have to make a plan for what time of day you read them.” They both knew that the reason for that was to avoid triggering his nightmares, but Lucy was grateful that Linus left it unsaid—the librarian didn’t need to know that. “But, Lucy, you consider me to be your dad?”

 _That_ was what he was surprised by? Wasn’t it obvious? “Well, sort of, right? You’re part of our family, aren’t you? And you teach me and protect me and take care of me and love me, and aren’t those the kind of things you meant when you said Arthur was our dad?”

“I… I suppose so. I just… I haven’t been here for anywhere near as long, and I didn’t think… Lucy, I’m touched.”

“I’m just saying, it makes sense. I didn’t mean to get you all mushy. Blech.” Lucy made a face. Linus chuckled fondly and ruffled his hair.

Linus turned back to the librarian. “Anyway, yes, scarier books are alright.”

The librarian thought about that for a moment and then asked, “Do you know Frankenstein?”

Lucy grinned devilishly. “Do I know Frankenstein? I love Frankenstein! There’s grave robbing, murder, blasphemy against the natural order, tons of cool stuff! But isn’t that a pretty big book?”

“The original is, but sometimes the big classics are adapted for younger readers, and I think we’ve got one of those that doesn’t hold back on the content. They can get away with that when it’s a classic.”

That sounded absolutely amazing to Lucy, so when she showed him over the section of the shelf where it was, he started to follow excitedly. He hesitated, though, over the ghost story book he was still holding. He didn’t want anyone to think he needed stories that were gentle about being scary, as if he weren’t already aware of darker things, so should he put it back? But then he would never find out more about the pirate ghost and the rest of the frankly awesome-looking crowd of spooky creatures. He brought it with him.

“Here it is!” the librarian announced, pulling a slender paperback off the shelf and handing it to him.

“Thank you!” He enthusiastically flipped to the beginning of the story. “My name is Victor Frankenstein,” he read. “I am the one who made the monster. I am to blame for everything. For all those he has killed. For those who have gone to bed in fear. For his still being alive to this very day.” Lucy finished that first paragraph and looked up from the page with a grin. “This is perfect, I love it!”

Lucy and Linus followed the librarian to two other suggestions. One of them was a massive tome (for the aesthetic—there were only ninety-three pages but they were printed on thick cardstock to get it to that size) that explained human anatomy by pretending to be a guide to building Frankenstein’s monster, and the other, offered after Lucy had asked, “Does this only talk about healthy human bodies, or does it have the interesting things like horrible diseases?”, was a slim paperback guide to epidemics and plagues throughout human history. Lucy was delighted. There were even little cards inside of the books showing that other kids had checked these out before. Maybe if he met those kids, they’d want to be friends with him.

Throughout the search for books, Lucy had been continually ensuring that the librarian took him seriously, making comments about poisons and curses and the end of days and doing his best to act as mature as he knew how so she wouldn’t start treating him like a little a kid again. He blew it, though, when he spotted the coolest book he’d ever seen, displayed on a little stand at the end of a shelf.

“Linus, look at that!” he shouted, bolting off toward it. By the time he got there he remembered the rule about volume and lowered his voice to a dramatic stage whisper. “Linus, look at this!”

Linus, who had been browsing a parents’ and educators’ section nearby, apologized on Lucy’s behalf to the librarians, who waved it off—this was exactly why children’s departments tend to be in the basement—and made his way over to see.

Lucy was bouncing on his toes. “This book has Chuck Berry, The Beatles, Billie Holiday _and_ Bob Dylan on the cover. Isn’t it the most righteous thing you’ve ever seen?”

“It _does_ look very cool,” Linus agreed.

Lucy pulled the book down from the display. It was a glossy paperback with the dimensions of a record sleeve, with colorful pages that described the life and work of twenty-seven legendary musicians. He flipped it over and scanned the list on the back of who was included. “Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, Little Richard…” He looked up the at the librarian. “This is incredible! Why did you tell me you had something so amazing?”

“It’s not what you asked for, my dear,” Linus reminded him. “You were looking for horror stories and plagues.”

“Oh, right,” Lucy said. He looked up nervously at the librarian.

“You’re into music, then, my friend?” she asked.

“Yes,” Lucy said hesitantly. He hoped his recent outburst wouldn’t make her go back to thinking of him as a little kid and change her mind about the Frankenstein book and the others. “I’m really sorry about the running and yelling. I hope it will not affect your opinion of my maturity.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, and to his surprise she didn’t say anything else on the subject. “But if you’re interested in music, we do also have a collection upstairs of records you can check out.”

Lucy’s eyes widened. “Linus, can we go and see that?”

“Of course! Didn’t Talia want to go see that seed thing upstairs too? Let’s go see if she wants to come with us,” Linus said.

Lucy took Linus’s hand and went off in search of Talia.

“It’s okay to be yourself,” Linus said casually as they walked.

Lucy was surprised at the statement. “I know that! I’m always myself. I talked about dark things to the librarian because that’s who I am, and I always do that.”

“What I mean,” Linus said, “is that it’s okay to be every part of yourself, not just the part you think people are expecting to see. I had to learn that for myself. When I was a kid, I emphasized and showed people the parts of myself that I knew they would expect from an autistic child like me, all the scientific names of sea creatures I knew and the way I always wanted the same seat at lunch and so on. Those were and are real parts of who I was and am, but I would have grown up a lot happier if I had also talked to the kids who liked the same adventure novels I did and other interests that didn’t fit in the box I had assigned myself. I’m not saying that’s necessarily what you were doing today—I’m not in your head—but I think it might be useful for you to think about in general.”

Lucy had plenty of questions about that, but just then he spotted Talia, which distracted him with the much more important thing they were doing. “Hey! You wanna go upstairs with us? We’re going to look at records!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lucy checks out _In a Dark, Dark Room_ by Alvin Schwartz (the cover described is the version illustrated by Victor Rivas), _Frankenstein_ adapted by Larry Weinberg, _Dr. Frankenstein’s Human Body Book_ by Richard Walker, _Plague!: Epidemics and Scourges Through The Ages_ by John Farndon and _Legends, Icons and Rebels: Music That Changed_ The World by Robbie Robertson, Jim Guerinot, Sebastian Robertson and Jared Levine.
> 
> He also tries to read _The Best Horror of the Year: Volume Twelve_ , edited by Ellen Datlow. I didn’t actually read this one, because he doesn’t either.
> 
> Also, I know Lucy wasn’t there in any of the canon instances where Linus said Arthur was the kids’ father, but the fact that he said it multiple times makes me think it could easily have come up around the kids too by now.
> 
> (Also, I absolutely did what Linus describes doing as a kid, and that’s why I relate so hard to the way it seems like Lucy kind of also does that.)
> 
> Special thanks to the THITCS groupchat on Tumblr for all the encouragement!


	2. Theodore

Theodore swooped down the stairwell ahead of his family and perched on the railing at the bottom, waiting for the others to finish the slow task of walking down with their feet (or pseudopodia, in Chauncey’s case). He gave an impatient chirp. “We’re on our way,” Linus assured him. They got to the bottom and Phee pushed through the big fire door so they could all pile into the children’s room.

After soaring in over the others’ heads, Theodore alighted on top of a nearby shelf (knocking over a couple of books on display) and looked around. The room was big and bright and had exciting things in every direction, and he spun in a circle trying to take it all in. With a step backwards, he teetered on the edge of the shelf, but managed to turn what would have been a fall into a somewhat controlled dive and swept upwards before he hit the ground.

As he settled onto the top of a magazine rack, he squawked adamantly that he was okay and that he meant to do that.

“Of course,” Zoe said.

He noticed at this point that Chauncey had just finished fixing the books he’d knocked over, so he chirped his thanks and decided it might be best to choose perches that didn’t have displays on top of them, just going forward. He scanned the room for a good place and fluttered over to a half-height wall separating the main room from a space where a bunch of kids were—wow!

Perched on the little wall, Theodore couldn’t believe his eyes. Kids were gathered around tables cutting and gluing and stringing beads on things with the most amazing array of arts and crafts supplies Theodore had ever seen. There were sequins and pompoms and things with glitter, googly eyes, pipe cleaners, almost anything Theodore could have thought of.

He took off to find Zoe again and swooped to the ground in front of her, chattering excitedly as he tumbled head over heels a few times and came to a stop at her feet. He stood and looked up at her expectantly.

“So, you want to join this arts and crafts thing?” Zoe said. “Alright, we can check it out.” She grinned and held out a hand to let Theodore hop up onto her arm and then her shoulder.

Theodore pointed the way to the event and explained to Zoe that he needed her to help him ask about joining, since the villagers didn’t understand his communication.

Zoe nodded. “Of course, no problem. Do you want me to stick around to help with that while you’re in there?”

Well. Theodore hadn’t thought about that. He tilted his head to the side and buzzed uncertainly. He was sure he might have more to say once he got started, but on the other hand none of the other kids in the room had their parents or guardians right there next to them, except for the really little ones. Theodore wasn’t a little kid! Or rather, technically he was pretty small, but he wasn’t the _age_ of those little kids. Almost certainly not, at least. It was times like this that he wished he knew his exact age so that he could be surer of that. Anyway, point is, he was in third grade and he didn’t want the other kids to think he was some kind of baby. But what if he needed something and couldn’t tell anyone? What if it was an emergency? The idea scared him and reminded him of before he came to Marsyas. The stakes were lower here with his family nearby, but the idea still upset him. He chirped hesitantly about it to Zoe.

Zoe thought for a moment. “Hmm, how about I leave the craft room, but stay nearby, close enough that we can see each other, and you can get my attention if you need me?” she suggested.

That sounded like it would be alright. Theodore gave a decisive nod.

When they got to the craft room, Zoe approached the woman in charge of the program. “Is there still time to join this activity?” she asked. “Theodore—” she indicated him with a nod “—is interested in participating.”

The woman in charge of the program looked back and forth between Zoe and Theodore like she wasn’t sure what to make of them. “Right. And how old is… Theodore?”

“He’s in third grade,” Zoe said, a smooth answer that Theodore appreciated.

“I see,” said the woman. “Well, Theodore,” he began slowly, addressing him for the first time since he got there, “we’re doing Halloween themed arts and crafts, so there are kids making treat bags, bookmarks and jewelry, if you want to pick out what you need for one of those, and then we can find you a seat?” She indicated the materials in front of her – some blank tote bags and bookmark-shaped pieces of cardstock as well as bits of stretchy cord for bracelets and necklaces.

Theodore’s eyes went straight to the bags and he hopped from foot to foot in enthusiasm, chattering excitedly about all of the wonderful treasures a bag like that could carry.

The woman looked at him blankly.

Zoe opened her mouth to translate, but Theodore was already hopping down to the tabletop and taking one of the bags in his mouth by the handles, so his choice was clear. He fluttered over to one of the activity tables and perched on the edge in front of an empty chair. “Well, it seems like you’ve got this under control,” Zoe said.

Theodore nodded firmly.

“I’ll be right nearby if you need anything,” she said, stroking his snout. Theodore gave a good-natured groan at her fussing but leaned in to nuzzle her hand and then waved as she left the craft area.

He turned back to the table and realized that the other kids were looking at him. He gave them an awkward little wave of his wing.

“Are you a dragon?” a redheaded boy asked.

“Don’t be ridiculous, dragons aren’t real,” said a girl with braided pigtails.

“Wyverns are real, though! Do you think he’s a wyvern?” a boy in a baseball cap pointed out and asked the other three.

“Aren’t wyverns supposed to be, like, super rare?” the redheaded boy said.

Theodore didn’t appreciate being talked about like he wasn’t there, but he tried to ignore them and set to work gluing black and orange sequins in the shape of bats and jack-o-lanterns to his bag and drawing on it with glitter glue. Occasionally he found a particularly cool shiny thing and tucked it into the bag to save for later.

“There’s supposed to be some kind of wyvern at the house on the island, though, isn’t there?” said the girl with the braids.

To Theodore’s surprise, the one girl who hadn’t spoken yet addressed him. She was soft-spoken with big brown eyes and had a lisp and an accent. “Is that true? Are you the wyvern from Marsyas Island?”

He chirped at her and nodded.

“It’s great to meet you!” she said brightly. “I’m Amira.” She offered a hand that Theodore gently shook with his claw.

He chirped his own introduction in response, and at her incomprehension, he cocked his head to the side thoughtfully. Then a solution occurred to him! He tapped a claw pointedly under where he had written “Theodore” in golden glitter-glue on his bag.

“Your name is Theodore?” Amira said, and Theodore nodded his confirmation. “Cool!” She indicated the other kids around the table in turn. “Here are my friends, Milton and Kailey and Zander.” The other kids each gave a small wave.

The redheaded boy – Milton, as Theodore had just learned – addressed him. “So, like, you can hear what we say but you just can’t talk?”

Theodore nodded at first, but then he felt the need to correct the technicality there, and started chirping about how of course he could talk, just not the same way as a mammal because he didn’t have the same vocal cords and the sounds he could make were different. He stuck some sparkly pompoms onto his bag and tucked one inside for safe keeping.

“It seems like he’s kinda talking now, though, huh?” said Zander, the kid in the hat, to the others.

“Would you quit doing that?” Amira said, louder than Theodore had heard her be so far, which seemed to surprise the other kids too. “It’s no fun to have people talk about you like you’re not there just because they have trouble understanding you. I would know – you guys remember right when I moved here? When my accent was bigger? People did that to me all the time. Even now sometimes, when I’m not paying attention to saying my ‘S’s the right way and everything. It sucks! Don’t do that to people!”

Theodore chirped in appreciation.

“Ah, you’re right.” Zander turned to Theodore. “I’m sorry, dude. I should have just asked you that. You’re right here, after all.”

“I was doing some of that too, earlier, wasn’t I?” Milton realized. “I’m sorry, too.”

“Yeah, me too,” said Kailey, the girl with the braids.

Theodore accepted their apologies vocally and with a friendly wave of a wing.

“So, you don’t go to Seaview Primary School, right? I haven’t seen you around,” said Kailey. “Do you have a school on your island?”

Theodore started to nod and then started to shake his head. He had _school_ , of course, but it wasn’t _a school_ , like, a building or something. He chirped about this ambiguity.

“Are you, like, homeschooled?” Zander asked.

At that, Theodore could nod, along with a motion like a shrug. He wasn’t sure how similar his lessons were to traditional homeschooling, with the six of them in their whole little classroom with the desks and the chalkboard and Arthur having had to study teaching and all, but it certainly happened in his home, which he supposed was the key bit. He stuck a skull sticker on his bag, and then added googly eyes.

“You still have to do maths in homeschool?” Milton asked, emphasizing the word “maths” in a way that sounded halfway between a word and a groan.

Ah, complaining about maths—this was a topic that Theodore could get into. He gave an emphatic nod, chattering his agreement with Milton’s opinion on the subject. Then he crossed his eyes and comically mimed getting knocked out, which made everyone laugh.

The conversation continued as the kids worked on their crafts. They shared their complaints about math and talked about school in general. Theodore learned that the others were all third graders at the local K-8 school, except for Zander, who was in fourth grade and was Kailey’s older brother. (Amira had a toddler sister, Milton had two stepbrothers in high school, and Theodore shared a bit about his own siblings.) They talked about their Halloween plans and their favorite books and how the library did big arts and crafts days like this on the third Saturday of every month.

Theodore noticed that Amira hadn’t spoken in a while. She reminded him of Sal in that way. In a quiet moment, he tapped a claw next to her art project and cocked his head inquisitively, chirping his curiosity at what she was making.

“Oh, my project?” she said, lighting up. “I’m making a bracelet to go with my Halloween costume! I’m gonna be a grim reaper, so I have these little skull beads to match my mask, and then orange and black glitter beads for Halloween, and green too because green is my favorite!”

Theodore chirped enthusiastically about how much he loved her color choices and the details of her bracelet and then curiously eyed the supplies table he’d gotten his blank bag from, where there were more strings of different lengths lined up.

Amira followed his gaze. “Oh, do you wanna make one too? They usually let you make another project if there’s enough stuff left! We should ask!”

Theodore nodded enthusiastically.

Amira got the attention of the woman running the program. “Hey, can Theodore do another project?”

By the time the woman finished saying, “Sure, there’s still plenty of materials,” Theodore was already making a fluttery hop over to the table in question. He selected a string for a necklace, long and stretchy to fit over his horns, and brought it back to his new friends’ table.

“Are you making a present for someone?” Zander asked.

Theodore shook his head and told them that he wanted the necklace for himself, tapping a wing against his chest.

“But Theodore’s a boy’s name, isn’t it?” said Milton. “Are you a boy?”

Theodore nodded confidently.

Kailey turned to Milton. “Boys can wear jewelry too, you know!” she said. “Theodore can do whatever he wants.”

“I know that!” Milton clarified. “I just don’t know any boys that do.” He turned back to Theodore. “That’s cool, dude. You do you.” He grinned.

Theodore nodded to Milton, and then to Kailey, expressing his appreciation for her defending him. Then he moved his bag aside, draped over the back of his chair and spread out for the paint and glue to dry, and turned his attention to the project at hand. Picking out the beads he wanted was easy enough. Some of them were associated with the program’s Halloween theme, which meant there were plenty of pretty orange ones to pick from, which Theodore appreciated—they would bring out his eyes—and ones made from that light green kind of plastic that glows in the dark. Besides the Halloween stuff, though, there were plenty of generic beads, and ones left over from other events, so Theodore had the opportunity to pick out a rainbow of colors, focusing especially on the stunningly beautiful glittery metallics in silver and gold, and a few interesting shapes like hearts and stars.

Once he had enough beads, Theodore considered how to go about getting started on the actual construction of the necklace. This was the kind of thing that made him wish he knew more wyverns, because observing the human kids around him do it with their thumbs and fingertips didn’t help much—Theodore didn’t have any of those. He thought for a moment, and then rolled onto his back so that he could use both talons. He picked up the first bead in his mouth, grasped the cord between the tips of the claws on his right talon, pushed it into the hole in the bead, and pulled it through with his other talon. After stringing a few beads this way, he got into a rhythm and was able to string his necklace almost as fast as the other kids.

As he worked, he kept up with the conversation at the table, although he wasn’t able to participate as fully because the beading involved his mouth and whole body. He would still contribute occasionally with a chirp or gesture, and he noticed with appreciation that the other kids, especially Amira, were going out of their way to keep him included, directing questions at him and looking to him for his opinion on things as they discussed what they hoped the library would do for next month’s craft day.

Zander had finished decorating the paper part of his bookmark and was adding beads to the string tied to the top when he encountered a problem. “Hey, the hole on this one doesn’t go all the way through!” He frowned and peered through the middle of the defective letter Z bead.

“Maybe you can find another Z?” Kailey suggested, and she helped him look. But they had no luck—like many of the styles left over from other programs, the letter beads were scarce, and this seemed to be the only Z left.

“Aww, man,” Zander said. “I already spelled ‘ANDER’ on here. What am I supposed to do with ‘ANDER’?”

Theodore set down his own project and reached toward the defective bead, chirping his request for Zander to let him see.

“Alright, dude, but it’s broken, it’s not gonna be any good for your thing either,” Zander said, handing it over.

Theodore took the little bead in his talon, turning it over and examining it carefully. Then he rotated it so that it was held between two sharp claws, one going into each end of the bead and pressing against the layer of plastic that blocked the opening. He pressed down until—pop! His claw poked through and made a hole in the plastic so that it would be possible to thread the bead. He handed it back to Zander with a pleased purr.

Zander’s eyes widened, and he looked through the middle of the bead again. He grinned. “Wow, Theodore, thanks, dude! That’s awesome!” With the Z now accounted for, he finished spelling his name on his bookmark and tied the ribbon at the top.

Theodore went back to his own project and soon finished stringing all of the beads that he needed onto his necklace, and then he encountered a new problem. He held up the two ends of the string and cocked his head. He knew he needed to tie a knot, but that wasn’t something he’d done before, and he wasn’t all that coordinated to begin with, and he didn’t know where to start. He tried taking the right end of the string in his mouth and passing the other end from his left to his right talon and back, first over and then under. When that didn’t work, and he’d tried it a couple times to make sure, he passed both of the ends of the string into one talon and tried twisting them together with the opposite claws. He made a low growl of frustration as he nearly dropped the whole thing.

“Hey, you want me to get that for you?” Zander offered, startling Theodore out of his concentration.

Theodore thought about it, and then nodded and handed the necklace to Zander, who draped it over his shoulders and tied it at the back of his head. Theodore looked down to see, and then chattered delightedly and chirped his appreciation.

Pretty soon the other kids were done with their projects too. “You wanna come look at books with us?” Amira asked.

As soon as Theodore processed the invitation, he nodded enthusiastically. The other kids gathered their stuff, and Theodore hopped down to the chair to pick up his bag, which had dried somewhat in the time it took to make the necklace, in one talon, and then followed his new friends as they made their way out into the wider children’s room. He caught Zoe’s eye as he left, to make sure she saw where he was going and wouldn’t wait up for him at the program room, and she gave him a thumbs up. He flew in short bursts from perch to perch along the path that the other kids walked, since he didn’t know any of them well enough to ride on their shoulder.

“I need to get the next Magic Tree House book,” Kailey said. “I finished the one about the new magicians, so now I need Blizzard of the Blue Moon. I really hope Merlin decides that Jack and Annie should be allowed to use magic!”

“Oh no, don’t tell me!” said Amira. “I just started the learning to use magic storyline! I need to get Season of the Sandstorms.”

“Man, I haven’t gotten to the Merlin ones at all yet,” said Milton. “I’m still only halfway through Earthquake in the Early Morning!”

“Oh, hey, that’s a good one, though!” Zander told him. “Enjoy it! I’m going to check out the next two, the one with the cobras and then the one with the rescue dogs.”

“Oh, I love when they have animal ones!” said Kelsey.

Theodore didn’t follow any of that. He cocked his head to the side and chirped inquisitively.

“Have you read any of the Magic Tree House?” Amira asked him.

Theodore shook his head.

“Oh, you gotta!” said Kailey. “They’re so cool! There’s these kids, Jack and Annie, and they go on adventures in the past and the future and with magic and it’s awesome!”

The other kids all exclaimed their agreement that the series was awesome, and that Theodore absolutely had to read it. By the time they made it over to the “O” section of chapter book fiction, they were more invested in getting the first book for Theodore than in any of the ones they were looking for for themselves.

Of course, for such a popular series, the library had multiple copies of the very first one and they didn’t have a problem finding it. Milton pulled it off the shelf and handed it to him. “In the first one they go back to the time of dinosaurs!” he said.

“Hey, the pterodactyl on the cover even looks kind of like you,” Kailey said.

Theodore examined the cover and decided he agreed, so he goofily imitated the pose from the picture and made everyone laugh. Then he tapped a claw against the image of the young boy riding on the back of the pterodactyl, shook his head, and mimed getting squished.

“Yeah, alright, we won’t try that,” Milton said with a grin.

“You gotta tell us what you think once you read it!” Zander said, and the other kids voiced their agreement, all very enthusiastic about Theodore’s opinion, and also apparently taking it for granted that they would hang out with him again, which felt awesome. He slipped the book into his new bag, and as soon as the other kids had finished picking out their next books in the series or noting that they’d have to go ask for a hold on the one they needed, the group set off to find new shelves to explore.

Kailey had seemed pretty disappointed that as it turned out, she would have to wait for a copy of Blizzard of the Blue Moon to become available. Theodore wished he could find a way to make her feel better about it. As the other kids set off, he decided to hang back for a moment in the fiction-with-authors-who-start-with-O section and look around a little more. He recalled there was a book he’d read and liked with an author who had one of those O-apostrophe last names, a fun mystery (since Kailey had mentioned that she liked mysteries) with a kid named Nancy something-or-other and… ah-ha! He spotted it, with the flowers along the spine. He nudged it off the shelf with his snout, slipped it into his bag, and hurried to catch up with the others.

When he caught up to them and landed on top of another shelf, he tapped Kailey on the shoulder to get her attention and then pushed the book out of his bag and toward her.

She was confused for a moment, but when she picked it up to take a look she grinned. “Wow, Theodore, this looks really cool!”

As she was holding it, he pushed it closer to her with his snout to indicate that she should hang onto it and chirped to tell her as much.

“Did you pick this out for me?” she asked.

Theodore nodded enthusiastically.

“Have you read it before?”

Another nod.

“Wow, awesome, it looks really great!” she said. “I’ll definitely check this out. This makes me feel a lot better about not having the Magic Tree House book I wanted.”

When the group continued on, Theodore kept pace with them this time.

They had made their way over to a section of floor in nonfiction, between the seven hundreds and the eight hundreds so that they could look at the comic strips and the silly poetry books, when Theodore looked up from the Calvin and Hobbes collection he was checking out and noticed a green eyestalk peeking out from around a nearby shelf. He greeted Chauncey enthusiastically and encouraged him to come out and say hi!

Chauncey inched out from around the corner and gave an awkward little wave. “Hello,” he said. “I’m Theodore’s brother Chauncey.”

Theodore indicated and introduced each of his new friends.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Amira, Zander, Kailey and Milton,” Chauncey said hesitantly.

Milton looked surprised. “Can your brother understand what you say?” he asked.

Theodore nodded and chirped an answer.

“Most people can understand him after they’ve been talking to him for a few weeks and get used to the way he communicates,” Chauncey said, interpreting smoothly the way Arthur used to do when Linus was new.

“Cool!” said Kailey. “So maybe if we call you on the phone a lot and talk to you with one of your family members helping translate, eventually we’ll be able to understand you too, without their help.”

“Yeah, that way you can tell us what you think of the Magic Tree House even before the next time we hang out,” Amira said. “I’m dying to see if you like it.”

Theodore chattered happily at the idea of that. First of all, it felt good that his new friends wanted to get to know how to communicate with him better, but even besides that, he was just as excited as they were to see them again and talk about the books.

Milton took his backpack off and reached inside to rip a page out of a notebook, then tore it in half. “How about we all write down our phone numbers for you on one side of this and you write yours for us on the other side, and then you can let us all know right when you finish the book?”

Theodore nodded enthusiastically and accepted the pencil Milton held out to him. It didn’t have the special grip on it that he used at home, so holding it in his talon was awkward, but he managed to legibly scrawl the phone number for Marsyas House. Arthur had ensured they’d all had it memorized before the first trip out to the village, in case any of them got lost. While he wrote, he asked Chauncey if he wanted to stay and hang out with him and his new friends.

“To help translate for you some more, you mean?” he clarified.

Theodore shook his head and assured him that no, he had it under control, and if he didn’t, he’d ask Zoe or Arthur or Linus. He just wanted to know if Chauncey wanted to hang out and meet his friends and talk about books.

Well, at the prospect of that, Chauncey looked hesitant, eyestalks wobbling. “Oh, I don’t know. That would make six kids at once, and that sounds kind of overwhelming.”

Theodore pointed out that there were six kids at home too.

“Yeah, but I know you guys already, that’s different,” Chauncey said.

Theodore chirped that that was fair and that he’d see Chauncey later, and Chauncey backed away with a smile and another awkward little wave.

At this point, Theodore’s number was done, and the other kids had written down their own three numbers as well: Zander and Kailey’s, Amira’s, and Milton’s. While Zander wrote down their home number, Kailey copied down Theodore’s twice to ensure that they could all bring home a copy. They shuffled the papers around until everyone was holding the one that was meant for them, and Zander reminded Theodore, “Please call us as soon as you finish the book! You can call any of us first and whoever you pick can conference the rest of us in.”

Theodore nodded enthusiastically.

“And I’ll call you to let you know what I think of Nancy Clancy,” Kailey added.

Theodore gave a chirp of approval to that.

Once that was settled, the kids went back to looking at books. When flipping through a couple of the silly poetry books he ended up choosing, Theodore encountered a poem about a crocodile at the dentist that he just had to show to Lucy and Talia later. When he started to look through the joke book that he’d selected, though, he groaned and rolled his eyes. This wasn’t very funny at all! Theodore was sure they could do better than that. Theodore himself could do better than that!

Amira noticed his annoyance and asked him what was wrong. He tapped his talon against the page, and she read over his shoulder. “‘Where do music teachers train?’ ‘Tuney-versity.’ Man, are they all like this?”

Theodore nodded. He chirped about how he’d be better off getting a book about writing jokes and doing it himself. He wasn’t sure how to convey this to her visually, but he tried mimicking the way he had been holding his talon to write earlier, and after a moment she got that part of it.

“You wanna write your own?” she confirmed.

He nodded firmly. He hopped over to the basket for books that you didn’t want to take and dropped the rejected joke book inside. Then he looked around and noticed that as Linus and Lucy and Talia headed upstairs, the librarian who had been helping Lucy was back at the desk. He got a little bit of an awkwardly running start so that he could take off from ground level, narrowly avoided tripping over the bag that was still clutched by the handles in his mouth and tumbling head-over-heels, flapped a couple times to get the altitude he needed, and glided over to perch on the edge of the librarian’s desk.

She startled a little when he made his sudden landing, then blinked at him. “Well. Hello. What can I do for you?”

Theodore chirped enthusiastically, explaining that he needed her help finding a book about writing jokes so that he could come up with enough jokes of his own to write his own joke book that was better than the one he’d found in the library.

The librarian listened and watched him as he talked, but when he finished, she didn’t seem to have any idea what he had said.

Theodore sighed. Talking to new humans sure could be a pain in the tail. He thought about what he might do to get his message across, and then, as he repeated his explanation more slowly, he gestured vaguely, first to the room full of books in general, and then to the comedy section he’d gotten the rejected joke book from. After that he paused, kind of stuck. He wasn’t sure what else to do to convey the rest of his message, and he knew that what he had done so far wasn’t enough as she still didn’t appear to understand.

At this point he noticed Zoe noticing the situation he was in, and she was on her way over to help. He shook his head and explained to her that he wanted another chance to try to do this by himself. He was in third grade, after all, and he felt like that should be old enough to do something like this without having an adult step in to handle it for him. Zoe nodded and stepped back wordlessly to give him his chance.

He was so focused on talking to Zoe that he barely realized Amira was following him up to the desk until she was almost at his side. It seemed like she was here to help too. He considered finding a way to indicate to her the same thing he’d told Zoe, but he decided that help from friends was different. Even adults needed their friends to help them with stuff, and he and his friends had been helping each other out all day. With that in mind, he just gave her an enthusiastic wave.

“Hey Theodore,” she said. “Are you talking about the thing we were just talking about, with the writing jokes?”

He nodded.

“Do you need books to help with that?”

He nodded again and chirped about how if he was going to come up with a whole book’s worth, he needed to do his research.

Amira turned to the librarian. “Can you help us find a book about how to write jokes?” she asked.

“Well, let’s see what we’ve got!” the librarian said. She did a search on the computer. “Hmm, it doesn’t look like we have any where the whole book is about how to write jokes, but there’s one about making your own comic strips that has a whole chapter on joke-writing. Would that be alright?”

That sounded even better to Theodore! Not only would he learn what he needed to write his joke book, but he also did like the idea of trying to make a comic strip. He gave an excited nod.

The librarian showed him over to where the book in question was, and he flew after her and perched on a nearby shelf. Amira followed too.

“Here it is,” she said, selecting a big, colorful paperback off the shelf and handing it to him. “Is that good for what you need?”

Theodore examined the book carefully and then nodded, chirping his approval. It was perfect. He slid it into his bag and then fluttered to the floor to formally thank the librarian by biting on her shoe. He did the same for Amira in appreciation for all her help.

“It was really nice to meet you today, Theodore!” Amira said. “I think my mom and sister are getting ready to go home now—" she gestured over to a young kids’ toy area, where a woman was helping a toddler put away the blocks—“but I hope we can hang out again soon.”

Theodore nodded and told her that he hoped so too. He went with her as she met up with their other friends, who were getting ready to leave too, which made sense as they had all been here for a while before Theodore’s arrival. They all said their goodbyes, and Theodore waved as his friends left, and then took off to investigate a display that had caught his eye because several of the books had shiny coins on the cover.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Theodore’s reading _Dinosaurs Before Dark_ by Mary Pope Osborne, _The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes_ by Bill Watterson, _A Pizza the Size of the Sun_ by Jack Prelutsky, _Where the Sidewalk Ends_ by Shel Silverstein (he mentions "The Crocodile’s Dentist" on page 66), and _Art For Kids: Comic Strips_ by Art Roche. He didn’t like _The Ultimate Kids’ Joke Book_ by Peter Coup. The book he recommends to Kailey is _Nancy Clancy, Super Sleuth_ by Jane O’Connor.
> 
> I’ve been trying to switch up the American and British terms to maintain the ambiguous dialect from the books but honestly it wouldn’t have occurred to me to say “maths” if not for the fact that I remembered halfway through writing that part that “maths” is canon. That one in particular for some reason still feels so weird to say.


End file.
